Student Spotlight: Garrett Geyer

Recently, I was given the extraordinary opportunity to interview Southern Door’s very own Garrett Geyer, a senior who has been racing his Monte Carlo street stock for nearly two years. “There’s this thrill, you just feel the thunder underneath the hood, you get this adrenaline rush when you go around the track, just passing other people,” said Garrett. “There’s a lot of stuff that goes into it. Mentally hard work; there’s a lot of nights where you stay up ‘till midnight just working on the car, trying to get it ready for the next race; and a lot of money stuck into it, too. It just all comes in; it’s a lot of dedication.

The first motor race was a reliability test, organized in 1894 from Paris to Rouen (France). The winner of this 50-mile race won with an average speed of about 10.2 miles per hour, taking them nearly five hours to complete! The first American race was held in Illinois on Thanksgiving, 1895, and the first speedway specifically designed for racing was built in 1906. As for popularity, “I think it used to be really popular back in the day, but I think it kind of died out around early 2000s, and I think it’s coming back as a popular thing nowadays.”

When I asked Garrett how well of a racer he thought he was, he responded with a confident tone. “I’m starting out, so I think that I’m pretty good for a rookie, but I’m not good yet. But starting out, I can see success in the future.”